Historic Barn & Farm Foundation of Pennsylvania

Watch this informative video featuring HBFF President Sheila Miller and HBFF Board Member and world renowned barn historian Robert Ensminger. Look at our new video section for more barn related videos

Mark your calendars now for the 2013 HBFF of PA Annual Meeting and Barn Tour – Friday and Saturday, June 14 and 15. HBFF will be touring historic barns of the Saucon Valley, Northampton County. HBFF members are given first consideration for the barn tour.  Please RSVP by May 24, 2013.

Click to download more information on the tour

Click to download the registration form

June 7-8 – The National Barn Alliance Annual Meeting at Bushnell Farm, Old Saybrook, CT. More information at http://www.connecticutbarns.org/

A bus load of barn enthusiasts came to “Dutch Country” for this year’s Historic Barn and Farm Foundation of Pennsylvania annual meeting and historic barn tour on June 15th and 16th.  This year’s event showcased seven historic barns in Lebanon and Berks counties.
Friday evening’s dinner in the barn loft of the Lantern Lodge in Myerstown featured keynote speaker Chris Witmer who provided a fascinating discussion on barn documentation.
Saturday’s bus tour featured a homestyle lunch at Light’s Victorian Farmhouse.  The group posed for a post-lunch photo next to the Light’s brick-end barn which was part of the tour on Saturday.

As part of the annual meeting, the Historic Barn and Farm Foundation of PA held its fourth election of five members to the  Board of Directors.  Newly elected were Judy Lengle, Joe Glass, and Michael Irvin.  They will serve three-year terms along with re-elected directors Bob Ensminger and Greg Huber.  Retiring from the fifteen member Board of Directors were John Hackman, Melissa Evans, and Jim Hoy.

For more information about our 2012 annual meeting and barn tour, order a copy of the Fall 2012 Forebay Post for $5 or join the HBFF of PA and receive a free copy.  Click on the membership link for a brochure.

MYERSTOWN — Lebanon Valley historic barns will be the highlight of this year’s
Historic Barn and Farm Foundation of Pennsylvania annual meeting and barn tour next
month. In its fifth year, the statewide non-profit organization is featuring eight historic
barns in eastern Lebanon County and western Berks County during the two-day event
on June 15th and 16th.

Former Berks County resident and professor emeritus at Kutztown University, Robert
Ensminger assisted in organizing this year’s barn tour and is excited about the size and
condition of the eight barns that will be visited. Ensminger is co-founder of the HBFF of
PA, along with Berks County’s agricultural coordinator, Sheila Miller. Formed in March
2007, the HBFF of PA has grown in numbers of members and geographical regions
since its beginnings. Its members, which exceeds several hundred in number, live
across Pennsylvania and in many neighboring states.

“Our annual meeting is an opportunity to network with some of the world’s foremost
authorities on historic barns and people who just simply love to see them on the
landscape,” said Miller. “We start at four o’clock on Friday, June 15th, at a barn I have
grown up admiring. It is located just west of Fredericksburg, along Route 22, and is one
of the largest barns in the area. It is picturesque with lots of decorative wooden trim
and is still being used as an integral part of the grain and beef operation.” Miller said
the Friday afternoon barn visit will be followed by the organization’s annual meeting,
fundraiser, and dinner at 6:30 p.m. at the Lantern Lodge in Myerstown.

“We will have a delicious buffet dinner in the loft of an historic, limestone barn that was

converted many years ago into one of the area’s finest restaurants. Dinner will be
followed by a brief business meeting and then our evening’s speaker, Chris Witmer who
will be sharing his many years of experience in documenting barns. He has published
articles on vernacular architecture in the Proceedings of the Vernacular Architecture
Forum and Pennsylvania Folklife,” said Miller.

Witmer worked for the Historic American Buildings Survey (division of the National Park
Service) in 1980, and has submitted nominations to the US Department of Interior’s
National Register of Historic Places. He is a past board member of the PA German
Society, contract staff member at Landis Valley Museum, Lancaster, and a volunteer at
Historic Schaefferstown, Lebanon County.

On Saturday, buses will leave the Lantern Lodge at 8:30 a.m. and tour seven historic
barns throughout the day. Participants will be guided through the barns by Bob
Ensminger and fellow HBFF of PA director Greg Huber of Macungie. Huber is a
founding member of the Board and has written the organization’s annual booklet with in-
depth details about each style and age of barn that is featured on the tour. Ensminger
noted that there will be several 18th century barns, log barns, and some of the longest
barns he has been in during his decades of documenting these structures. Lunch will
be at Light’s Victorian Farmhouse and Lebanon County Historical Society’s Bill Ruhl will
discuss the Krall barn preservation project, a major undertaking for that organization.

The HBFF of PA invites anyone with an interest in Pennsylvania’s treasure trove of
barn architecture to participate. HBFF of PA membership is not required to attend,
but special rates apply for members of the organization, along with members of
the Lebanon County Historical Society and the Berks County Historical Society.
Registration for one or both days is required. All participants in Saturday’s tour must
ride on the bus.
The cost of each day’s event is $60 for HBFF of PA members and $85 for non-
members. Spouse price is $40 for members and $60 for non-members. For more
information, contact Sheila Miller, president, at 610-589-5617

Download the Registration Form – Download the Press Release

The Historic Barn and Farm Foundation of Pennsylvania is pleased to be traveling to the “Great Valley” of Pennsylvania for its 2011 Annual Meeting and Historic Barn Tour. This two-day event is scheduled for Friday, June 17th and Saturday, June18th, beginning with a special evening touring an historic barn owned by one of HBFF of PA’s directors, Eugene Wingert, Loudon Road, Saint Thomas.

This massive barn is located on the old Wilson homestead, along what was formerly the Old Forbes Road. It is a prototypical Franklin County brick Sweitzer barn, according to HBFF of PA’s Vice President Greg Huber. “It possesses the distinctive rear brick out-sheds. Its great end-wall brick patterning is a powerfully expressed local building tradition and it reflects several of the barns on this year’s annual HBFF of PA barn tour,” he commented. “These brick barns have never been seen before seen on any of the previous years’ HBFF of PA annual barn tours. They are great treats to behold and will not soon be forgotten.”

Members and non-members are welcome to participate in this educational and social gathering in Franklin County. There will be a banquet at the St. Thomas Fire Company following the Friday afternoon barn tour Wingert’s farm. The tour begins at 4 p.m. and the banquet will begin at 6 p.m. Barn documenter Phil Schaff of Chambersburg and HBFF of PA director Dianna Heim will present an informative program entitled: “Cumberland Valley Barns: Past and Present—Brick End Barns of Franklin County” following a brief business meeting of the HBFF of PA.

Phil Schaff, a native of Chambersburg, began working in a local camera store around 1964. He spent a decade working for that business. He photographed nature and landscapes over the years. Since 1999, he has been working on a project to document Franklin County’s brick-end barns. This resulted in the release of a poster depicting nineteen of the 109 (so such barns in the county. The poster was made possible through the Chambersburg for the Arts and several local historical societies. Since retiring in 2004 from a 28- year career as a fuel truck driver for McCleary Oil Co., Phil enjoys being able to spend more time taking photographs.
Dianna Heim will be speaking about the men and women who built the Franklin County barns, sharing stories related to her by an old barn builder who provided a wealth of information on how he, his father and his grandfather raised barns. She will provide us with information about how the Civil War affected the farms in the area, and how the barns were used during that time,She will share the progression of log to brick-end barns in the valley.

According to HBFF of PA secretary, Ken Sandri, the “Great Valley” of Pennsylvania was part of the early migration routes for American immigrants moving west from the colonial settlement areas on the east coast of the new English colonies. The earliest settlements and then cities began near harbors and major rivers where commerce flourished. One of America’s first and greatest economic opportunities came in its ability to utilize wide expanses of land to feed its citizens and later export its harvests to the world.

“The highly fertile lands of the Lehigh and Cumberland alleys became a natural thoroughfare for settlers going west that were looking to acquire their own land to clear and establish an agrarian lifestyle. Franklin County is an unbroken extension of the wide fertile land called the “Great Valley.” Early in the 1700s and into the mid-1800s, farms were established to produce the crops that helped expand America. These farms still operate y,” Sandri said.

Saturday will be devoted to touring eight historic barns in Franklin County. A boxed lunch and tour at the Conococheague Institute, Mercersburg, will divide the day of historic barns. Saturday’s schedule begins at 8:30 a.m. starting from the lot across the street from the Four Points Sheraton, 1123 Lincoln Way East, Chambersburg, PA 17201 and concludes at approximately 5 p.m. All participants in Saturday’s tour must ride on the bus. Reservations are required to participate in either or in both days’ events.

The cost of each day’s event is $60 for HBFF of PA members and $85 for non- members. Spouse price is $40 for members and $60 for non-members. If a non-member participates in both Friday’s and Saturday’s event, the member price applies to the second day.